Bad Girl
by LetTheRadioBreakTheSilence
Summary: Nate pretends to be Mitchie's boyfriend to avoid a publicity nightmare after a drunken night. Can he get break through her tough exterior and bad reputation to show her that they really should be together? Will she be able to let him in? NITCHIE.*HIATUS*
1. Chapter 1

"For what it's worth, you deserved it more."

I glanced over at the girl who had just sat down next to me. We'd come all the way to London for the MTV European Music Awards to _lose _"Best Pop Album" to some 15-year old girl who could barely carry a tune. I'd smiled and congratulated her, but I was pissed. Apparently, I wasn't as good of an actor as I thought, because this girl noticed.

She was beautiful. She had dark, brown hair and pretty brown eyes. She had a gorgeous black dress on, which definitely flattered her body. I didn't recognize her, but I could tell she was American. Maybe she was somebody's date.

"Thanks," I replied, as sincerely as I could manage.

"I'm Mitchie Torres," she told me.

I shook her hand. The name sounded familiar, but I couldn't put my finger on where I'd heard it. "Nate Black."

"Yeah, I know. You look like you're more than ready to go."

I had to laugh a little. Apparently, I was a _really _bad actor. Good thing I could sing, I guess.

"Yeah, I've been ready to leave since I got here, pretty much," I admitted. "I just wanted to see Blonde Get-Up perform."

"Oh, are you a fan?" she asked, perking up a little. She had a great smile.

"I don't know anything about them, to be honest. We've been on tour for so long, and…it's kind of like being in a different world. You lose touch with what's going on."

Blonde Get-Up was a new chick band that had been nominated for "Breakthrough Artist."

"Oh, I see," she replied. She gave me a mischievous smile. "So, just curious, then? Did you hear they were good?"

"Well, I guess they would have to be to be getting so much attention, right? The only thing I've really heard about them was that they have a really hot lead singer," I admitted.

Mitchie laughed. I liked her laugh. I wasn't used to girls just coming up and talking to me like I was a normal person…it was kind of nice. Especially when the girl was as gorgeous as she was.

"Well, I hope you're not disappointed. I've heard the same thing, though," she said. "I have to go, but…it was nice meeting you."

"Yeah, you too," I replied.

It was the truth. I didn't really want her to leave. But if she was there as someone's date, it's not like it really mattered anyways, I guess. I slouched down in my sheet and watched the award for "Best R & B Song" being announced.

"And now," the presenter said once the award had been collected. "It is my pleasure to introduce our next band. They're up for 'Breakthrough Artist of the Year' and they're about to show you why. Give it up for Blonde Get-Up!"

I watched the lights come up on the stage. The lead singer had her back to the audience, but her outfit was definitely hot. She was wearing black leggings, knee high leather boots, and a _very _short, leather, strapless dress that tied up like a corset in the back. I have to be honest…I may be a rock star, but I am totally intimidated by really fierce girls. But _damn_, when she turned around and I could actually see her, she was…Mitchie?

"Shit," I said, mostly to myself, but Shane heard me.

"What?" he asked quietly so the people around us couldn't hear. "Dude what did I tell you? She's fucking hot. I can't believe you didn't freak out when she started talking to you."

"Thanks for the heads up," I replied sarcastically. "I didn't know who she was. I told her the only reason I was staying to see this band was because I heard the lead singer was really hot."

Shane started cracking up. He always found humor in my embarrassment. I don't know why I was so embarrassed, but it probably had something to do with how hot she looked up there. And the fact that she was an _incredible _singer…

"Dude, relax. _She _talked to _you_, remember?" Shane pointed out. "She could have talked to anybody. There has to be a reason she chose you. Especially when she _could_ have talked to _me_."

I rolled my eyes, but he did have a point. Hopefully she didn't think I was shallow because of my comment. Why did I care so much what she thought of me? I'd talked to her for like two minutes. Maybe I was shallow – the only thing I really knew about her was that she was gorgeous. And that this song was amazing.

"Do you know who writes their songs?" I asked Shane. We should hire him, whoever he is.

"Yeah," he replied. "She does."

Gorgeous, amazing singer, _and _incredible writer? Shit, why did I let her walk away without at least finding out what after-party she was going to? She _had_ to be going to Vanity Fair party – it was always the biggest, and if you were invited, you _never _turned it down. They always invited the breakthrough artists. I would find her there if it took me all night. I didn't know what I would say once I found her, but I had some time to figure it out. I was always kind of bad with girls, surprisingly. Not to sound conceited, but it's not like I didn't have girls throwing themselves at me every day of my life…it's just when I found one I actually wanted to get to know, I got freaked out. I was always afraid of saying the wrong thing, and I could already tell she was a girl who was hard to impress.


	2. Chapter 2

I glanced around at all the people at the party, hoping I would be able to spot her. After a couple minutes, I saw her at the bar.

"Ya know, you could have told me who you were and saved me the embarrassment," I said as I sat down next to her on an open bar stool.

"Where's the fun in that?" Mitchie smirked. "Not that I could see the look on your face, but I'm sure it was priceless."

Yeah, it probably was. "Congratulations, by the way."

"Thanks. I wasn't worried. We deserved it."

I watched her run her fingers through her long, brown hair and take a sip of her martini. _Damn_. She was _really_ beautiful. And full of herself, which was usually a huge turn-off for me. But for some reason, it was kind of attracting me to her. I guess there's something to be said for believing that you can do anything, right?

"You must think I'm pretty damn cute," she said, pulling me out of my thoughts.

I guess she caught me staring. I looked away towards the crowd, hoping she would drop the subject. She didn't.

"Come on, you can say it. I'm a babe."

I laughed, a little uncomfortably. It seemed like the more confidence she had, the less I had. She was really intimidating. "I think you tell yourself that enough for the both of us."

"Nate!"

I looked in the direction of the voice that had called my name and saw Shane and Jason waving me over to the round table they were sitting at. Before I could even ask Mitchie if she wanted to come with me, she was already making her way towards them.

"She ordered this…" the bartender said to me, setting another martini down on the counter.

I nodded and picked it up to take to her and ordered a shot of tequila for myself. By the time I caught up, they'd all already introduced themselves.

"Thanks!" she grinned when I handed her the glass. "I was just telling them about how uptight you are. Has anyone ever told you that?"

"I'm not uptight," I replied defensively.

I looked towards the guys for back-up – they pretended like they hadn't heard me. I saw her wink at Shane and Jason. I knew what that meant. They'd already made an unspoken decision to make me look like an idiot. _Wonderful._

"You need to learn how to have some fun. Truth or dare?" she asked.

I sighed. What the hell did it take to impress her? She wasn't giving me any hints. Whatever, I definitely needed to be drunk to play this game. I slammed my shot down and waved to a waiter for another.

"Truth."

She pretended to think about it really hard for a moment. "Hmm…on a scale of one to ten, how much of a babe do you think I am?"

I rolled my eyes as the guys started cracking up. They'd obviously had a few drinks since I last saw them. "Are you serious?"

"I've never been more serious in my life. Don't I look serious?"

No, she didn't really, but I knew she wasn't going to drop it. I looked her square in the eyes, hoping she would pick up on the fact that I wasn't enjoying this game. "You're a ten and you know it."

Mitchie smiled. "Yeah, but it's nice to hear sometimes. Your turn!"

I hadn't realized that I would actually get a turn to choose someone. I thought she was just trying to get to me. My friends hadn't helped me out at all, so it was time for a little payback. "Jason, truth or dare?"

I took another shot and looked around for a minute. I saw a group of really gorgeous girls standing near the dance floor. "Go over there and try to get two of them to leave with you."

"Two?"

"Or more," I shrugged.

Jason nodded, took another shot, slammed the glass down on the table, and walked towards the girls.

"Um…excuse me," Shane said, looking passed me.

I looked over my shoulder and saw exactly who he had noticed. Her name was Tess Tyler. She was a model, and they'd hooked up a few times. He was obsessed with her to the point that it was kind of just pathetic.

"Truth or dare?" I asked Mitchie.

"It's Jason's turn to ask," she reminded me.

"He's busy," I replied simply. "Truth or dare?"

She finished off her martini and motioned for another one. "Truth."

I never would have asked this, normally. I'm a subtle guy. But she obviously wasn't into subtle, and with the alcohol kicking in, I was barely even nervous asking her. "Are you attracted to me at all, or are you just messing me around? Because I think it's been made pretty clear that I'm attracted to you. And I don't want to…"

"I meant dare," she said.

She took the martini a waiter was handing to her and took a sip. She stood up. Was she leaving?

"You can't just switch because you don't want to answer the…"

She stepped over my lap with one leg so that she was straddling me and kissed me before I could even finish my sentence. This was a better answer than I expected. I wrapped my arms around her waist, hands on her lower back and slowly moving downward. I didn't understand this girl _at all_, but right then, I didn't really care at all, either.

I heard Jason clear his throat loudly. He had the worst timing. Mitchie broke the kiss and looked at me, a devious smile on her face.

"Are you guys ready to go?"

"You want to leave already?" I asked, astonished.

I usually had to drag him out of the club kicking and screaming at closing time. He looked behind him, so I did, too. There were two gorgeous blondes standing there.

"They said yes."

Mitchie and I both started laughing.

"Let's go," she whispered in my ear.

No way was I saying no to that. I jumped up and starting leading her to the car, my arm around her waist.

"What about Shane?" Jason asked, following me with a blonde on either side of him.

"I think he has alternate transportation…" I smirked, pointing to where he and Tess were making out in the corner. Jason rolled his eyes.

Our hotel wasn't far, but the drive seemed to take forever. The way she was looking at me made me really nervous and really excited all at the same time. She was everything I usually tried to avoid in a girl – over-confident, full of herself, harsh, tough, forward…she didn't think before she spoke. She did whatever she wanted to do at that very moment. I usually liked girls that were more soft-spoken and sweet. But for some reason, it all worked for her. She was exciting. And mysterious. And I liked it.

"I can't believe those girls actually said yes," I laughed as I slid my key card through the sensor to unlock the door to my hotel room.

I held the door open for Mitchie and closed it behind her. I felt around for the light switch in the dark and the room flooded with light as I flicked it on. Mitchie turned around to face me, smiling that sexy smile of hers. She was going to get me into trouble, I could already tell. She took a few steps towards me and flicked the light switch off again. Then she stood on her toes and kissed me passionately, her tiny backwards steps leading me towards the bed. She unbuttoned my dress shirt and then started pulling at the hem of my undershirt.

"Wait," I whispered, regretfully breaking the kiss. "You had a lot to drink, and I don't want you to wake up regretting this…"

I could feel her soft hands on my abs, and I kind of wished I had ignored my conscience and stayed quiet.

"Are you drunk?" she asked, but she already knew the answer.

"Well, yeah, but…"

She rested her hands on my belt and I _really _started to regret telling her to stop. She whispered in my ear, in her distinctively sexy tone that made her all the more irresistible.

"Then how do you know I'm not taking advantage of _you_?"

She didn't wait for an answer before pulling my shirt over my head and tossing it to the floor. Her logic was good enough for me.


	3. Chapter 3

I woke up to "Sexy Back" blasting from Mitchie's cell phone. She groaned it and grabbed it sleepily from the nightstand. She checked the caller ID and pressed talk.

"Hey, Trish…"

I think Trish was one of the girls in her band. During the drive back to the hotel last night, she'd told me about them, but I was internally freaking out too much to comprehend what she was saying. I'm really not the kind of guy who takes a girl home the same night that he meets her, contrary to the rock star image.

"Shit…okay, listen, I can fix this, okay? Stop yelling at me, it's going to be fine. Just trust me, okay? Give me a chance to…okay, yeah, I'll see you then. Bye."

Mitchie hung up the phone and muttered something I couldn't understand. She wrapped one of the sheets around her body and got out of bed, heading for the door.

"Is something wrong?" I asked.

That was a stupid question. Obviously, something was wrong. Was she just going to leave in a sheet? I watched her open the door, but instead of leaving, she picked up the newspaper and came back inside. She sat down on the bed again, flipping through the pages until she found what she was looking for.

"Dammit!" she said angrily.

I looked at her, confused, waiting for her to tell me what was going on. She noticed and turned the paper so I could see the gossip section – a big picture of her, straddling me, with a drink in one hand and the other in my hair…and me with my hands on her ass. I smiled despite myself, thinking back to the night before.

"Stop smiling," she told me angrily. "This is horrible."

Wow, she was quite the drama queen. I can think of a million worse things that could have happened.

"It's not _that_ bad…" I started.

"Yes, it is," she assured me. "You don't understand."

I took the newspaper from her and set it on the floor so she couldn't look at it anymore. She actually looked pretty upset, which surprised me. I don't know why, it's not really like I knew enough about her to know how she would react. I guess she just seemed like the kind of girl who just didn't care.

"Then help me understand. What's the big deal?"

Mitchie sighed. "I know you've been 'out of touch' in your tour la-la land or whatever, but…I guess I've become the new 'bad girl' in the media. I just…I don't like everyone to know my business, ya know? The other girls finally got really pissed off about it and told me that the next time I did something like this…I was gone. And this picture makes me look like a slut. And even though I can drink here, I'm not old enough to at home, so I'm sure the press will give me plenty of shit about that…"

I nodded understandingly. We had the same situation with Shane a couple years back. It was really hard for me and Jason to deal with – I can only imagine how it was for Shane to get that kind of ultimatum.

"How long are you staying in London?" she asked.

"Um…I think we'll be here for about a week? We just kind of wanted a break after the tour before we have to get back to work," I explained.

"You don't have a girlfriend, do you?"

"No," I replied a little defensively. It bugged me a little that she thought I might be the kind of guy who would sleep with someone else when he had a girlfriend. But I guess that's part of the rock star image, again. Did that mean she could have a boyfriend? I hoped not.

Mitchie looked at me for a moment before finally speaking. "Look, I know this is really unfair of me to ask you…but, do you think you could just, like…_pretend _to be my boyfriend for a few days? Just while we're both in London, so that this isn't a big deal. If we told people that we'd been secretly dating for a couple months, nobody would care that we were kissing. People will get over the fact that I was drinking even though I'm not 21…hopefully, at least, since I'm legal here. And then, when we go back to LA, we can 'break up'. If you don't want to, I understand, it's just that…"

"I'll do it," I interrupted her.

I don't know why I agreed. The last thing I needed was to be associated with a 'bad girl'. My publicist was going to kick my ass. But despite that…despite the fact that she was my total opposite, that she was not my type _at all_…I wanted to get to know her. If I was pretending to be her boyfriend, we'd have to spend more time together so that people would believe it.

Her eyes lit up and a grin spread across her face. "Really?"

"Yeah, why not?" I smiled, trying to shrug it off so she couldn't tell that I was kind of freaking out inside again.

She kissed me. "Thank you."

Wow. I hadn't expected that. I get to do more of that as her fake boyfriend, right? That's definitely something I could get used to.

"No problem."

She jumped out of bed and started pulling on her clothes from the night before. God, she was beautiful. I _really _didn't want her to leave.

"I have to go meet the girls for breakfast…but do you think we could meet up again later tonight? I mean…we should go on a date or something, right? So the paparazzi will see us together," she suggested.

I got to take her on a date? This just kept getting better and better.

"Yeah, definitely," I agreed. I grabbed a pen and pad of paper from the nightstand and scribbled my cell phone number down. "Give me a call when you're free, and I'll come pick you up. I mean…that's what boyfriends do, right?"

She smiled at me graciously, taking the piece of paper from my hand. "Thank you so much."

I nodded and walked her to the door. "So, I'll see you later?"

"Yeah," she replied. "I'll call you."

"I'll be waiting," I joked. Okay, it wasn't a joke at all, but I didn't want her to think I was creepy so I made it sound like one. "Bye."

Mitchie waved at me and stepped out into the hallway. I watched her make her way to the elevator before I closed the door. I had a few hours to figure out where to take her tonight, and I wanted it to be perfect. I picked up my cell phone and pressed one of the speed dial buttons. Shane, Jason, and I were supposed to meet for breakfast anyways, and hopefully they would be able to help me come up with some good ideas.

**A/N: Thanks to cherryblossomjen for suggesting I allow anonymous reviews. I didn't even think about that! And thanks to everyone else for reading so far. I have a basic idea of where the story is headed, but if you have any suggestions, I'll take them! Please review!**


	4. Chapter 4

I walked down the long hallway in her hotel to get to her room. I couldn't believe how nervous I was. After breakfast, Shane had Googled Mitchie. He thought it would give me an edge if I knew more about her. Well, we'd found out why everyone thought she was a bad girl, at least.

"How can you be famous and _never _talk to the media?" Shane asked in disbelief as he skimmed through the article. "It says that any time the paparazzi ask her a question, she freaks out."

"What do you mean, 'freaks out'?"

"Like…she screams at them," he told me. "And like…throws stuff."

"Why?" I asked.

Shane shrugged. "Doesn't say."

I was still trying to figure out what reason there could be for her to do that. It made me all the more anxious about our date. Not that I was having second thoughts, because I wasn't. Actually, for some reason…it made me want to go out with her even more. She was complex. I wanted to figure her out. It didn't seem like anyone else really had. But would she let me?

"Hey," Mitchie smiled when she opened the door and saw me.

"Hey," I replied, trying hard not to stare. "You look incredible."

She really did. She was wearing dark jeans and a long, pink tee-shirt with a black vest over it. It was simple, but it looked amazing on her. Everything probably looked amazing on her, though. She grabbed her purse and jacket before stepping out into the hallway and closing the door behind her.

"Thanks," she said quickly. "Where are we going?"

"Well, I thought we could…"

"Put your arm around me," she interrupted, looking out the main entrance of the hotel at a couple dozen photographers who had followed me there and watched me go inside. I'm sure they all knew she was staying there.

She didn't have to tell me twice. I snaked my arm around her waist and pulled her closer to me. The doorman held open the door for us and we stepped outside, greeted by camera flashes from every direction.

"Just stick to the plan, okay?" she whispered to me.

I nodded, leading her in the direction of the restaurant. I'd chosen one that was only a couple blocks away from her hotel. I wanted to do something special after, so I'd gone downstairs to ask the people at the front desk what they would suggest. The woman working there told me about these gardens that were lit by candlelight at night down by the river, and she said it was really romantic.

"How long has this been going on?" one of the photographers shouted at me.

"A couple months," I replied casually. "I'm just glad it's all out in the open now so I can show my girl off."

Mitchie smiled up at me. I don't know if it was genuine or if she was just trying to look convincing as a couple, but I hoped for the former.

We got to the restaurant quickly and were taken to a more private area. I'd called ahead to make sure that it would be available so we would be able to talk without having a bunch of people looking at us. And we did – we talked a lot. And every word that came out of her mouth just made me like her more. She was blunt when she talked about people, and sometimes a little…I don't want to use the word bitchy, but I think that's the only way to describe it. But not in a mean way, really. She was honest – just not always in the most tactful way. And she was funny. I loved how she would laugh in the middle of trying to tell a story. It was so cute. The only awkward moment was when I asked her about her parents. She got quiet for a moment and then said, "We've been talking all about me. Tell me about _your_ family."

"Kiss me," she said when we were getting ready to leave.

We were near the windows, and the paparazzi could see us. I hoped that wasn't the only reason she wanted to kiss me. But even if it wasn't now, maybe it would be later. So I kissed her. Maybe this whole act could be like an audition – to be her real boyfriend.

"Hold my hand."

I laced my fingers through hers and pushed the door open for her. Again, we were met with cameras and questions.

We made our way through the crowd and I looked up and down the street for a taxi. I didn't understand what that article Shane was reading earlier was talking about – Mitchie was sweet. I couldn't even picture her going off on one of the photographers. She was smiling for them and being totally pleasant.

"Mitchie!" one of them called to her. "Is it true that your mom is dead?"

The smile instantly vanished from her face. She walked up to him and glared at him.

"Who said that my mother was dead?" she demanded.

The man shook his head. "I can't reveal my sources. So is it true?"

She grabbed his camera right out of his hand and threw it on the ground. "Fuck you!"

Okay, I guess the article _did _have some merit. She came running back towards me, looking really pissed off. I waved for a cab that was heading in our direction and quickly got her inside.

"Can we just go back to my hotel?" she asked, her angry tone indicating that it wasn't really a question.

"Uh, yeah. The Dorchester, please," I told the cab driver.

We were there within about a minute, since it wasonly a couple blocks away. I wrapped my arm around her shoulders protectively and pushed through the paparazzi into the hotel. She practically pulled my arm out of its socket dragging me to her room as fast as she could go. She fumbled with the keys, her hands shaking, so I took them from her and opened the door. She slammed it behind her furiously.

Mitchie walked to the other side of the room and seemed to just be looking at the wall for a moment, her back turned towards me. I didn't know what to say. I really had no idea what was going on. I'd never really been good in these kinds of situations, anyways.

"Damn it!" she screamed suddenly.

I decided I should stop standing there like an idiot, so I crossed the room to where she was standing. I put my hand on her shoulder, which was probably more awkward than comforting. I had no idea what I was supposed to do.

"Hey, are you ok…" I started, turning her around to face me.

She was crying. I _really_ hadn't expected that. She didn't seem like the kind of girl who would cry about anything. I pulled her into a hug and she started sobbing into my shirt. It was heartbreaking to see her so upset, especially when I couldn't do anything about it, since I didn't know what it was she was crying about.

"It's okay, Mitchie," I told her quietly. "What's wrong? Talk to me."

She sat down at the end of her bed and rested her head in her hands. I sat down next to her and put my arm around her.

"Nothing, it's nothing."

"Mitchie, obviously it isn't nothing," I stated the obvious. "Come on, talk to me. Tell me what the problem is, and we'll figure out how to fix it."

"I wanted to protect him from all of this," she said quietly.

"What? Who?"

"Brandon…my little brother," she clarified. "He's six."

"Mitchie, people start rumors all the time," I told her. "Just because someone started a rumor that your mom died doesn't mean it's going to affect him…"

"My mom _did_ die," she whispered. "Three years ago. She had leukemia."

"Oh…I'm sorry."

I didn't really know what else to say. I sucked at this.

"But…that doesn't mean your brother is going to have to deal with the media, really…" I told her. I wasn't really sure where I was going with it – I just wanted to make her feel better.

"It will when they find out that he's sick."

"Sick?"

Mitchie looked up at me sadly, and I could see tears forming in her eyes again. "He has leukemia."

"Oh my God," I said, surprised. "I'm _so_ sorry."

All of the sudden, the article made sense. She didn't "freak out"…she panicked when they asked about her family. I hated that she had to be labeled a "bad girl" when all she was trying to do was deal with something that terrible. It made me feel good that she had told me, though – that she had trusted me enough to tell me. Maybe that meant she was feeling the same way I was. All of the sudden, I felt like I had unlocked a whole new piece of the puzzle – this was all an act. The attitude…it was her way of dealing. Her way of playing defense. Her way of keeping people out so they couldn't get too close. But she'd let me in, at least a little.

"And now that they're butting into my family life…they're going to find out. I know they will."

I didn't know what to say to make it better. She was probably right. Then, I had an idea.

"Well, let's do something," I told her.

"What?" she asked.

"They're all interested in 'us' right now, because they were surprised by it. If we do something…I don't know…something crazy, they'll all forget about your mom. They'll just focus on us," I explained.

Mitchie smiled a little. "You would do something crazy for me?"

"Yes!" I replied way too eagerly. "I mean…yeah, I guess…ya know, whatever…I still have to prove you wrong about me being uptight, right?"

She giggled. "You're sweet, Nate."

_She said I was sweet._ That was good, right? Hopefully she meant 'sweet' in the boyfriend way instead of the just-a-friend way.

Mitchie yawned and ran her fingers through her hair, pushing it out of her face. "I think I just need to sleep this off. We can figure out our 'something crazy' tomorrow."

She moved up to the head of the bed and lay down. I was disappointed, because I really wanted to spend more time with her, but I didn't really blame her for just wanting to crash.

"Okay. I'll…I'll call you tomorrow, then."

"Wait," she said when I started to walk towards the door. "Do you think you could stay, for a little while? I feel better when you're here."

My heart sped up when I heard her last statement. That _had _to be good.

"Yeah, of course," I replied. She patted the bed next to her. I slid my shoes off and sat down, letting her curl up under my arm, her head on my chest. "I'll stay until you fall asleep."

"Goodnight, Nate," she yawned.

I smiled and kissed the top of her head. "Goodnight, Mitchie."

**A/N: I'm having a little trouble with the next chapter, so it might be a couple days before the next update, but the chapter after that I have pretty well planned out. Thanks for reading! Review!**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Sorry for the wait, I have been swamped with homework! I still have a lot to do, but I figured I deserved a break to update. Enjoy!**

I slowly opened my eyes and glanced around. I must have fallen asleep, too, because I was still in Mitchie's room, but she wasn't there. I sleepily made my way out of the bedroom and into the living room. She was sitting on the couch with her laptop in her lap.

She looked over at me and smiled. "Good morning."

"'Morning," I replied, glancing around the room hoping that she had made coffee.

Mitchie laughed and pointed to the counter that separated the living room and kitchen area, where there was a coffee pot and mugs. I guess it was pretty obvious that I wasn't a morning person. I poured myself a cup before I sat down next to her.

"I'm ready, so we should go to your hotel so you can get ready, and then we'll go, okay?"

"Go where?" I asked.

She smiled that devious smile again, and I could only imagine what she had planned for me today. "Ever been to Paris?"

I shook my head and stared at her with a confused look on my face.

"_Something crazy_," she reminded me. "The flight's only an hour, we'll fly commercial so the paparazzi will know where we're going…if they have a spontaneous trip to Paris to write about, they'll forget all about my family. Paris is the most romantic city in the world, right? It's perfect. We can do all the romantic tourist stuff during the day, and we can go out at night. They have the wildest clubs."

I'd totally forgotten that I had agreed to do something crazy with her. I could already hear my publicist raging on me for whatever the hell I was about to get myself into, but I was excited. I never did anything spontaneous. Some people might think that Mitchie was bringing out the 'bad' side of me, but I didn't think that was true. She was just making me do things I never did because I was afraid to lose my 'good guy' reputation. She made me see that maybe there were more important things in life than how the press portrayed me – like having fun and being happy, for starters.

"Okay, let's go," I agreed.

Mitchie grinned and closed her laptop, setting it on the table in front of her. She stood up and slid a pair of pink stilettos on, which poked out from underneath her dark skinny jeans. She had on a cool black shirt and a vest, and her hair was straightened.

We found a taxi and went to my hotel, which was only a few miles away from hers. When we got up to the room, Shane and Jason were sitting in the kitchen area drinking coffee and reading the comics.

"Hey, guys," I said. "You remember Mitchie, right?"

"Yeah, of course," they both replied.

"I'm going to take a quick shower," I told Mitchie. "There's coffee and cereal and stuff, if you want anything."

She nodded and poured herself a cup of coffee before she sat down at the table with Shane and Jason and started talking to them. They looked like they were getting along, so that was a good sign. If everything went according to my plan, they'd be seeing a lot more of her.

When I'd taken a shower and gotten dressed, I went back into the kitchen, where they were all eating cereal – of course, it was Apple Jacks. Shane, Jason, and I actually bonded over our love of Apple Jacks at camp when we first met and started eating breakfast together. I know, sad, right? The first morning, Shane found the prize in the cereal box, and ever since then, it had become a contest. We lost track of who was actually winning by the end of camp, but we still made a point to announce it if we got it.

"Dude, I know this is fake and everything, but we like her," Shane told me as I got a bowl out of the cabinet. "She asked if we had any Apple Jacks and we fell in love. So once you guys fake-break up…"

"Hey, watch it," I said, pretending that I was joking. "That's my fake-girlfriend you're talking about."

Mitchie laughed and Shane smirked at me. He knew it bugged me, even though I knew he was just messing with me. He knew how I felt about her.

"Hey, I got the prize," I told them triumphantly as I picked it out of my cereal bowl.

It was a plastic, silver ring with a big, blue, plastic gem in the middle. Usually it was at least something cool like an action figure or something. I put it in my pocket and sat down at the table with the rest of them to eat my cereal.

When we'd finished eating, we headed over to the airport to catch our flight. Mitchie was right; it was only about an hour to Paris. We'd seen the paparazzi follow us to the airport, and some of them even bought tickets for the flight so they could follow us. When we stepped off the plane at the airport in Paris, there were even more of them waiting for us.

"You were right, they really do love us," Mitchie whispered to me. "Where do you want to go first?"

I shrugged. "Wherever you want."

"Do you want to see the Eiffel Tower?" she asked. "That's totally the kind of cheesy romantic place they would love to see us at."

"Yeah, sure."

It was really bothering me how she was only talking about where _they _wanted to see us go. I wished she wanted to go somewhere because _she wanted to be with me there_. Maybe she did. Maybe this was just her way of covering it up. After all, I guess I had technically been the one to come up with this idea – to go somewhere they would see us, but really so I could spend time with her. Maybe she was doing the same thing. I hoped so, at least.

"Let's go to the top. You can see the whole city from up there," Mitchie told me once we got there.

She took my hand and led me to the elevator. It was really fast. I was thanking God the whole way up that I wasn't afraid of heights.

"Look," she pointed to something below us. "That's the Iena Bridge. And over there, that's the Arc de Triomphe. Can you see it? And that's the Louvre. Did you know they paint the Eiffel Tower every seven years?"

"How do you know all this stuff?" I asked her.

She shrugged. "I don't know. I just like history and stuff, I guess."

She kept surprising me, and I liked that about her. I liked everything about her. So I kissed her. I could tell she was surprised – so was I, to be honest – but she wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me back. I hoped it wasn't just because people were taking pictures of us with their cell phones.

When she finally broke the kiss, she was smiling at me – that was a good sign, right? I got nervous when she didn't say anything, so I looked back over the city and shoved my hands into my pockets. I felt something and pulled it out – it was the ring.

"What's that?" Mitchie asked.

"It's the prize from the cereal box this morning," I told her. I took her hand and slid it on her ring finger. "Here."

"Nate, it's beautiful!" she gasped dramatically.

We both laughed, and she kissed me on the cheek. I wanted to kiss her again, but I didn't want to press my luck if she still wasn't sure how she felt about me. So instead, just put my arm around her and looked down at the most romantic city in the world.


	6. Chapter 6

"Hey."

I looked up to see Trish, one of Mitchie's bandmates, standing a few feet from me. As soon as we'd gotten off the plane back to London, Mitchie had to go to a photo shoot with the rest of the girls and had invited me to come along. I wasn't about to pass up an opportunity to be with her, so I didn't hesitate to accept.

As predicted, I'd already gotten a call from my publicist, screaming at me for some pictures that showed up in the tabloids this morning of me and Mitchie at a club last night. I told her we were just dancing – she said it wasn't dancing, it was groping. But whatever. I let her yell for a few minutes and then told her I had to go. I didn't care. I had fun. More fun than I'd ever had maybe in my entire life. We stayed at the club until it closed, and then we just walked around Paris until our plane back to London left in the morning. I don't think I've ever actually stayed out all night before. I was dead tired now, but it was worth it. Mitchie was incredible.

"Hey," I replied.

"Can I talk to you for a second?" Trish asked, sitting in the chair next to me.

"Sure…what's up?"

I tore my eyes off of Mitchie for the first time since we got there. Trish was pretty and blonde – very much Shane's type. Mitchie introduced me to all of the other girls when we got here –Trish, Ella, and Caitlyn – but they didn't acknowledge me with much more than a 'hello,' so I was curious as to what she wanted to talk to me about.

"Look, Nate…I'm really not one to stick my nose into other people's business, but…" she started. She looked away from me and to Mitchie. "I just…I think I should warn you about Mitchie."

"What do you mean?" I asked, a little defensively.

Trish sighed and ran her fingers through her hair, noticeably uncomfortable. "I just mean that…Mitchie…she toys with guys. I love her, don't get me wrong, she's one of my best friends…but she does. It's like, she leads guys on until they fall in love with her – and they do, they always do – and then she moves on. She doesn't really do relationships, I guess. I usually mind my own business, but I know what the music business is like, and I know how quickly you can lose everything if you get distracted. I just wouldn't want you to get distracted for a girl who probably isn't going to commit to you in the end. I mean, she has her reasons and everything, but…"

"She told me about her mom," I interrupted her.

She stared at me blankly for a moment. "Really?"

"And her brother."

"_She told you about Brandon_?" Trish asked, shocked.

I nodded. I swear, her jaw almost hit the floor. It made me feel great that she was so surprised – between her reaction and what she had said, I'm pretty sure it meant that Mitchie had never told another guy what she'd told me.

"Oh, well…wow. Um…well, just be careful, okay?"

Why did she feel the need to warn me about this, anyways? It's not like it was real…

And then I realized – Mitchie didn't tell them. She didn't tell them that this was just an act. She let them believe that we were really together. I didn't know what to make of that. I told Shane and Jason, so I guess I just assumed she would have told them, too. Why wouldn't she?

"Yeah, okay," I replied, trying to hide my confusion. "Don't worry about me."

"Okay. I'll, uh…I'll talk to you later," Trish said quickly as she stood up and walked back towards the other girls and the photographer.

"What was that about?" Mitchie asked, sitting down next to me.

"Um, nothing," I lied. "Hey, why didn't you tell them that we aren't really dating?"

I tried to sound casual. I think she bought it. Even after no sleep, she still looked gorgeous.

She shrugged. "I don't know. I guess I thought they couldn't be mad at me about the picture if they thought you were really my boyfriend. Like, it's not slutty to kiss your boyfriend, ya know?"

"They didn't think it was weird that you hadn't told them that we'd been dating for months?"

"Well, Caitlyn liked this guy awhile ago, but she said she didn't go out with him because she thought it might distract her. So I told them that I remembered that and I was afraid they would worry that I would get distracted, so I figured that if kept it a secret for a little while, when I told them they would know that it hadn't distracted me and they wouldn't have to worry," she explained.

I was beginning to think she was kind of an evil genius. I never would have thought of anything like that.

"MITCHIE!" her manager screamed as he stormed into the room.

She sighed, annoyed. "I'll be right back…"

I watched her walk over to her manager, who looked furious. He was waving around a magazine – I bet it was the same one my publicist saw. He seemed to calm down after she talked to him for a few minutes. She took the magazine from him and came back over to where I was sitting. She had a huge grin on her face.

"Look," she laughed, handing me the magazine. "They think we're engaged."

On the cover was a grainy cell phone picture of me putting the ring on her finger. The quality was terrible, so I could see that you really couldn't tell it was just plastic. If the picture had been of anyone else, I probably would have thought it was real, too.

"This is a good thing?" I asked, trying to figure out how she walked out of that heated argument with her manager still smiling.

"Yes! Don't you get it? If we keep them guessing…and don't tell them whether or not it's true…it's _all_ they're going to be trying to figure out! They won't give a shit about my family anymore!"

Mitchie caught me off-guard when she crashed her lips into mine. Not that I was complaining, of course. The reason it really surprised me, though, was that she did it when there were no paparazzi around. She wanted her band to believe we were really dating, yeah, but still. They obviously believed her already, so she didn't have to prove it to them. Maybe she was actually kissing me because she really wanted to.

"Mitch, come here," her agent called to her.

"I think we'll be done here soon, okay?" Mitchie said to me.

I nodded and she kissed me quickly again before she jogged over to her agent. Another one of the girls, Ella, came over to me and sat down. She was tall and tan, with dark hair and eyes.

"Get ready, this is going to be hilarious," she warned me.

"What is?" I asked.

Ella grinned. "You know how Mitchie doesn't talk to the press, like ever?"

"Yeah…"

"Jennifer is about to tell her that she has to do an interview with the European MTV guys. It's already all set up," she smirked. "And three…two…one…"

"WHAT THE FUCK, JEN?!"


	7. Chapter 7

"I can't believe I'm seriously about to do this," Mitchie whined.

"It's not that bad," I promised her. "And when you're done, I'll take you somewhere special and you can forget it ever happened."

We were waiting in the green room at the British equivalent of TRL. She was going on after the #3 video was finished. I think they thought that was clever because the top two videos were going to be our video for "Bittersweet Blonde" and her video for "Your Plastic Heart," we just didn't know in what order.

"Where are we going?" she asked, for the millionth time.

"If I told you, it wouldn't be a surprise."

I was going to take her to those gardens – the candlelit ones that I was going to take her to the first time I took her out. Mitchie was going back to LA in three days, but the guys and I were leaving in two. If something real was going to happen between us, it needed to happen fast. I just wanted to take her somewhere romantic, where we could really be alone, so then if something was going to happen…it could just happen.

"Okay…" she replied, pretending to be really disappointed that I wouldn't tell her. "I don't get what they were thinking when they signed me up for this interview…I'm trying to keep everyone _out _of my family business. How the hell is this going to help?"

"Just keep the conversation on the music and us. That's all they care about right now," I told her.

I took Mitchie's hand and touched the ring on her finger. She'd put on a different one – a diamond ring that had been her mom's – because people would obviously know we weren't engaged if they got a closer look and saw that it was made of plastic. But she was still wearing the plastic one, too, just on a different finger. I hoped that meant she thought it was special…maybe because it came from me?

"I'm glad you're here," she smiled at me.

"I'm glad I'm here, too."

I leaned in and kissed her, but she pulled away after a few seconds.

"We don't have to pretend right now, Nate. Nobody's here," she reminded me.

Ouch. I guess I'd totally read those signals wrong.

"Oh, right," I tried to laugh it off.

"Mitchie? You're on after the commercial break," one of the crew told her.

She sighed. "Well…here's goes nothing."

"It's going to be fine, I promise. I'll be here when you get back."

"Thanks," she replied as she stood up and left the room.

I grabbed the remote and turned up the volume on the television, a live feed from the stage.

"And next we have the lead singer of Blonde Get-Up, in her first interview ever…Mitchie Torres!" the host, Damien, introduced her.

Mitchie walked out onto the stage, smiling and waving to everyone. She looked incredible. She had left her hair wavy instead of straightening it, and her outfit was awesome.

"How are you, Mitchie?" Damien asked her.

"I'm great, how are you?" she replied, taking a seat next to him.

"I'm good, thanks. Shall we just get down to business? I know there are a few questions on everyone's minds I'd like to ask you."

"Let's do it," she smiled enthusiastically.

"I'm sure you can guess the first topic…" he joked.

"Is it cute and an amazing kisser?"

Amazing kisser, huh? I liked where this was going already. I hoped she wasn't just saying that.

He laughed and looked at the ring. "Let's just get this question out of the way – are you two engaged?"

Mitchie grinned and gave him a mischievous look. "We're very happy. That's all I'm going to say."

"How did you meet?"

I froze. Why hadn't we thought of that? We'd made up answers for every other question he could possibly ask about us – how had we forgotten the most obvious? Obviously the real answer wasn't going to fly.

Mitchie didn't miss a beat. "Well, he brought his little sister to one of our shows a few months ago, and they came backstage afterwards. We started talking and we just really hit it off."

Wow, if this music thing didn't work out, she could be an actress.

"What do you think of the other guys in Connect 3?" he asked.

"Shane and Jason are so much fun! And Nate gets along great with the girls, too. That's really important to me," she explained.

"What do you like most about him?"

Mitchie thought for a moment. I was definitely interested in what her answer would be.

"Nate is such a sweet guy. He's always there for me, and he's really easy to talk to. And I always have fun with him, even when we're just lying around," she told him.

"We have to go to commercial, but when we come back, we'll talk a little about your new single and introduce the top two videos," Damien said, and the audience clapped.

"Nate!" Mitchie said into her microphone while she made a 'come here' gesture that I could see from the live feed.

She wanted me to go out there? I looked over to a crew member to make sure I was even allowed to do that. He nodded, so I left the green room and stepped onto the stage, much to the surprise of the audience. They all started screaming. I bent down so I could whisper to her.

"What's up?" I asked her.

"Please tell me you have a little sister," she whispered, covering her microphone.

I laughed. "Yeah…Taylor. She's twelve."

"Thank God," she sighed, relieved.

"Hey, can you stay?" Damien asked me.

He looked between us to make sure it was okay with both of us. We looked at each other and nodded. "Yeah, sure."

I sat down next to Mitchie and laced my fingers through hers.

"And we're back, with Mitchie Torres _and _Nate Black!" Damien announced. "Now, Nate, what's _your _favorite thing about _Mitchie_?"

I kissed the back of her hand and smiled. "That's easy. Everything."

A collective "aww" came from the audience. It was cheesy, yeah, but it was the truth. I couldn't think of anything I didn't like about her, other than the fact that she wasn't my actual girlfriend.

"Well, one of you has the number one video, and one of you is second. Would you like to announce our number two video?" he asked.

"Sure," we both replied.

Mitchie took the envelope from him. "And the loser is…"

She opened the envelope very slowly to be dramatic and handed it to me to read. I glanced at the answer and smirked.

"Sorry, baby. The number _two _video is 'Your Plastic Heart' by Blonde Get-Up," I announced. "Which means…who's number one, babe?"

She rolled her eyes. "You are…"

"Thanks for being with us today, guys," Damien said to us. "Roll the video!"

He shook our hands when the video started playing and we headed back into the green room.

"That wasn't so bad, was it?" I asked.

"I guess it wasn't _that _bad…" she admitted. "Can you tell me where we're going now?"

I shook my head. "You'll have to wait and see. But let's grab something to eat first."

**A/N: Can you tell I'm having a lot of fun with these band name/song title generators? Kind of a lame chapter, sorry. I have sort-of an idea of what's going to happen on their date, but I'm having a little writer's block…so if you have any suggestions, PM me!**


	8. Chapter 8

"Are we there? Where are you taking me? Can I look yet?"

"Almost," I laughed. "You're so impatient."

"You hadn't figured that out about me yet?" Mitchie smirked.

She'd been asking questions constantly since dinner, but I wanted to take her to the perfect spot. There was a place in the middle of the gardens that was full of roses, and in the candlelight, I knew she would love it. I hoped so, at least, because I was trying to get the balls to tell her that _really_ like her.

"Okay, we're here," I told her.

I took my hands away from her eyes so she could see where we were. She gasped and looked around the garden. She liked to act tough, but I knew even _she_ couldn't pretend she wasn't impressed.

"Wow…Nate…this is…this is…" she stuttered.

"Beautiful?" I offered.

"Yeah."

"Perfect?"

"Yeah."

I bit my lip nervously, hoping I didn't regret asking this. "Romantic?"

"Yeah," she agreed again, still looking around at the gardens. "What made you bring me here?"

I hoped that would have been obvious so I didn't have to say it. Maybe if I hinted at it enough, she would get the point.

"Well…we've just been spending so much time trying to convince everyone else that we're together and we know each other so well…I thought it would be nice to spend some time alone so we can _actually _get to know each other," I explained, and then I kind of started freaking out that it seemed like I was forcing her to get to know me. "If you want to, I mean. But if you don't, that's totally…"

"Nate," she interrupted me with a giggle. "Of course I do. Why do you always act so nervous around me?"

"Do I?" I laughed uncomfortably. Was it really that obvious?

Mitchie shrugged. "Maybe I'm just not used to hanging out with gentlemen."

"What do you mean?" I asked casually. I figured that comment was either really good, or really bad.

Mitchie sat down on a bench near us. I sat down next to her, not as close as I wanted to, but hopefully that would change soon. She smiled at me and ran her fingers through her hair. She rested her hand gently on my thigh, which released the butterflies in my stomach I thought I had pretty well contained.

"You remind me of my dad." Great. She laughed – apparently I didn't hide my disappointment very well. "Sorry, that came out wrong. I mean…you remind me of how my dad treated my mom when she was…" She stopped for a moment. "When she was alive. He bought her flowers every Friday on his way home from work. He always did things like that. They were so happy. I used to tell myself that I would never settle for a guy who didn't try to make me happy like my dad did for my mom. I guess at some point I stopped believing there were still guys like that around."

That, I think, was _definitely_ a good thing. Even though I didn't know what to say, I couldn't help but smile. It meant a lot to me that she could talk to me about her family, even just a little, for all the time she spent trying to keep people away from the subject.

"I…" I started, still unsure of what the right thing to say was.

Luckily, I didn't have to figure it out, because she interrupted me – she kissed me. _She _kissed _me_ – and I mean _really _kissed me – with nobody around. No cameras, no reporters, no fans, no friends. Just us, alone, not trying to prove anything to anybody. It was the perfect moment to tell her how I felt about her.

"Mitchie, I…" I started when she broke the kiss after a couple minutes.

"We're always talking about me. You must think I'm so full of myself. It's your turn," she interrupted me.

"Mitchie, I've been trying to…"

"What made you start playing the guitar? How did you meet Shane and Jason? What about your sister? Taylor, right? What's she like?" she asked.

I sighed. My brief surge of confidence had come and gone. What the hell was I so afraid of? _She _just kissed _me_. That should have been enough to convince me that she at least liked me _a little_. But I was still afraid that she was just…I don't even know. Messing with me? Trish said she liked to do that. I didn't think it was that way with me, because she told me about her brother, but what if it was? Maybe I would just make a fool of myself if I told her how I felt. If I didn't tell her now, I would still have a couple more days to show her why we should really be together.

"I started playing the guitar in the fifth grade."

**A/N: sorry, kind of short chapter. I don't have the next chapter written yet, but I have it pretty much planned out, and I actually have time to write for once! So, it should be coming soon (the more reviews I get, the more motivated I feel…*wink wink*) and the two after that are mostly written.**


	9. Chapter 9

"Dude, she kissed you, she likes you. Thousands of girls dream about being your girlfriend, so why is it so hard for you to believe that a girl actually likes you? I mean, more of them are dreaming about being _my _girlfriend, but…"

Shane had been trying to convince me that Mitchie really did like me since I'd gotten back from our date. He made a good point, but I still wasn't sure.

"But she didn't kiss me when I took her back to her hotel. She would have if she liked me, right?"

"Maybe she was waiting for _you_ to kiss _her_," Jason pointed out.

"Yeah, but you're too big of a bitch to," Shane added.

I rolled my eyes at him. "You really know how to make a guy feel better."

"I'm not trying to make you feel better," he replied. "I'm trying to make you feel like a bitch so you'll finally grow a pair and start telling _her _how you feel about her instead of telling _us_."

"What's the worst that can happen?" Jason asked. "She bruises your ego a little?"

I wasn't as worried about my ego anymore as I was my heart, but I decided to keep that to myself. They were giving me enough shit as it was.

"I tried to tell her last night, but she changed the subject," I told them. "She didn't want to hear it."

"Or maybe she didn't realize you were trying to tell her something important?" Shane pointed out. "It doesn't sound like you really pushed it."

I guess that was true. I could have made her listen if I really wanted to. I just wish I had a little more time.

"Would you guys mind staying an extra day?"

"Why?" they asked.

I sighed, preparing myself for the comments they were about to throw at me. "Mitchie's staying until Monday."

"Dude, seriously? Why are you acting like you're never going to see her again after we leave London? She lives in LA…we live in LA. She'll be at every industry party…so will we. It's not like she's dropping off the face of the earth," Shane reminded me.

"But she wants to 'break up' when we leave London, and then she never has to talk to me again if she doesn't want to. And if we're 'broken up,' we can't really be seen together without every tabloid writing about it."

Jason started laughing. I gave him an annoyed look, because I didn't really see what he could possibly think was so funny about this. Unless he just enjoyed watching me agonize over this. Actually, I wouldn't really have been surprised if that was the case. I mean, if the tables were turned, I would probably be enjoying this.

"Sorry," he said, but he didn't stop laughing. "Isn't it just ironic how this came around and bit you in the ass? Because this whole thing started so the tabloids _would _write about you."

Okay, that _was_ a little funny. I would probably laugh about it later, but right now I wasn't in the mood.

"_One _more day," Shane agreed. "If you haven't told her by then…"

"I will, I will," I promised. "Thanks."

"And you have to introduce us to those girls in her band," Jason added.

"Deal," I nodded quickly.

"Hey, guys, I'm glad you're all here," our manager, Rick, said as he burst through the door.

Rick didn't get excited like that unless there he'd come up with a _really _good idea. Otherwise, he was pretty much the mellowest person I'd ever met in my life.

"What's up?" we all asked.

He sat down in a chair across from us with a huge grin across his face. "I just got off the phone with some of the reps from the label."

"And…?"

"And, what do you guys think about co-headlining the next tour with Blonde Get Up?"

"Seriously?" I said quickly. I wasn't sure I'd heard him right.

"Think about it," he replied. "The two hottest pop bands in the world right now, together? You'd sell out every venue in the world, guaranteed."

"That's probably true…" Shane nodded.

"And we'd get their fan base, too," Jason pointed out.

"And…" I would get to spend three months traveling around the world with Mitchie. "…it would be a blast."

"Did Mitchie say anything about this to you?" Jason asked me.

"She wouldn't have," Rick told him. "The reps just pitched it to me and I wanted to run it by you guys before I talked to their manager about it."

"I can see Nate planning the wedding in his head already..." Shane joked.

I punched him in the arm, but I was grinning. Three months with Mitchie would be awesome. Especially if she really _did _like me. I checked my watch – it was too late to go over there and tell her about it. But tomorrow, I would go over there in the morning to surprise her, take her out to breakfast, and tell her all about it. Hopefully, she'd be as excited as I was.

"So? You guys are interested?" Rick asked, pulling me out of my mental planning.

"Yeah, definitely," we all nodded.

"Great," Rick replied. "I'll give their manager a call in the morning to set up a meeting. You guys should get some sleep."

"Come on, Rick, we're on vacation," Jason whined.

"Fine, go out. But Monday morning, you're back in the studio," he conceded, standing up and walking towards the door.

"Oh, actually, dude, we're going to have to reschedule that. We're staying an extra day," Shane informed him.

Rick looked at him skeptically. We had a tendency to make decisions without telling him about them, which is probably one of his biggest pet peeves. "Excuse me?"

"Nate needs more time to woo his lady friend," Jason smirked.

Rick looked at me and I gave him a pathetic look. The one thing he hated more than when we changed plans was our ability to get him to agree to it.

"Fine," he sighed. "_Tuesday _morning, you're in the studio."

"Thanks, man," I said graciously.

"Well, repay me by convincing Mitchie to put a good word in with her manager about this idea," he replied.

"You got it."

**A/N: Okay, I have a couple questions and I would **_**really **_**like everyone to review or PM me with your opinions. The next two chapters are finished, and a lot of the stuff that's been going on so far will get wrapped up, but I have no idea what will happen next. What do you want to see happen (other than Nate and Mitchie getting together, or not getting together, etc.)? Also, I don't know if I'm going to do anything with this yet, but I figured I'd ask and maybe it would help me generate some ideas: if Shane and/or Jason were to have love interests from Mitchie's band, who would you want to see them with? Trish, Caitlyn, or Ella? Someone else? Do you even care about the other characters?**


	10. Chapter 10

I knocked on Mitchie's door eagerly. I couldn't wait to tell her about what my manager had said. Going on tour with her would be incredible. And maybe, if I was lucky, she would realize that she felt the same way about me as I did about her. After last night, I thought maybe she did. I couldn't even think of anything better. Maybe if she was excited, I'd get the courage to tell her how I felt.

Caitlyn opened the door. "Hey, what's up?"

"Hey, is Mitchie here?" I asked.

She looked confused. "No…she left, Nate…"

I probably looked just as confused as she did now. "What do you mean 'she left'?"

"I mean she's gone."

"Where did she go?" I asked urgently.

I thought I had two more days with her! It wasn't very long, but any time I could spend with her was worth it. She hadn't even told me she was leaving.

"Back to LA…her dad called like an hour ago…Brandon's had to go to the hospital again so she left right away to be with him," she explained, still confused. "She didn't tell you any of this?"

"No."

"Did you guys get in a fight or something?" she asked.

Maybe I should just tell her the truth. I hadn't really spent a lot of time with her, but Mitchie _had_ told me that Caitlyn was her best friend. Maybe she'd be able to help me figure Mitchie out. She seemed cool enough not to freak out if I told her what was really going on.

"No…" I started, arguing whether or not to tell her. "We were never really dating."

"What?"

I sighed. "Mitchie thought that people wouldn't think the picture of us kissing was a big deal if we were dating…so we've been pretending, and when we went home we were going to 'break up'."

Caitlyn looked a little surprised, but not nearly as much as I had expected. "I thought it was weird that she didn't at least tell _me _that you two were together before a few days ago…but you were very convincing."

"Yeah, well…I don't want to pretend anymore."

"Well, now you don't have to. She's gone," she reminded me.

"No…I mean I don't want to _pretend _to be her boyfriend anymore," I admitted.

"You really like her?" she asked.

"Yeah. I like her a lot."

Caitlyn smiled and looked down at her watch. "Well, what are you waiting for? Her flight doesn't leave for 45 minutes. You could probably still catch her. Heathrow airport, terminal 3."

Caitlyn just became my best friend, too. I could have kissed her, if I didn't want to kiss _her _best friend so badly.

"Thanks, Caitlyn," I replied, but I had to ask one more question before I left. It was killing me. "Caitlyn...did she...I don't know, say anything about me?"

"Only answers to questions I asked about you," she told me.

That wasn't the answer I wanted. At all. "Oh...okay. Well, I'll see you."

I started to walk away but I heard her voice behind me. "But she was happy."

"What?"

"She's been happy," she repeated. "At least, until an hour ago. She's been really happy."

I grinned. "Thanks."

I ran down to the lobby and out onto the street. I must have looked like an idiot waving down a cab that frantically, and there were plenty of paparazzi around to document it. But whatever. I didn't have much time. I jumped into the first taxi that stopped.

"Heathrow. Hurry, please."

It only took twenty minutes to get there, but it felt like hours. I ran inside and looked around for the terminal.

"Can I help you, sir?" an employee asked me.

"Terminal three?" I asked.

She pointed the right way and I took off in that direction. I saw her standing in line to board the plane. She always wore bright colors, so she was easy to pick out of the crowd. I _knew_ I liked her style for a reason…

"Mitchie!"

She turned around and looked around for a minute before her eyes landed on me. "Nate? What are you doing here?"

She stepped out of line as I approached her, so we were out of earshot from the other people. "Caitlyn told me about Brandon. I'm so sorry."

"Thanks, Nate…but I really have to go…"

"I'll go with you," I said immediately.

Mitchie smiled and put her hand on my cheek. "Nate…you're so sweet. And I really appreciate everything you've done for me this week, but…I thought now would be a good time for us to 'break up,' ya know? Then people will think that's the reason I'm leaving early, and we can both get back to our real lives."

My heart shattered into about a million pieces. I guess the whole time, part of me really thought that she wouldn't want to 'break up' in the end. She'd see how good we were together, even if it was just pretend, and she would want it to be real. Go back to my real life? My real life would suck now that I knew what I would be missing without her in it. I was such an idiot.

"Oh, yeah…okay…that makes sense," I said quietly.

She moved her bag to her other shoulder and smiled at me again. "She's really lucky."

"Who?"

"The next girl who gets to be your real girlfriend," she explained. "I hope she realizes what she has."

I didn't have any response. Was she giving me an opening? She was probably just being nice. If I'd learned anything about her this week, it was that she was direct – if she wanted to be with me, she would have said so. I'd just been kidding myself this whole time thinking that maybe she really _did _like me. I just nodded and forced a smile.

"Thanks for everything, Nate," she said, and she kissed me on the cheek. "Goodbye."

"Bye, Mitchie."

By this time, there was no line anymore. She gave the flight attendant her ticket and disappeared into the terminal. My life sucked. She was leaving. I was letting her get away. And I was too big of a coward to do anything to stop it.

I slumped down into one of the seats in the waiting area. How could I just let her walk out of my life like that? I should have told her how I felt about her. What was I so afraid of? I didn't tell her, and she walked out of my life. If I _had _told her, she still might have walked out of my life…but she might have stayed, too. Maybe.

I must have been sitting there for about ten minutes before I realized how big of a dumbass I was really being. Sitting here feeling sorry for myself wasn't going to get her back. I ran up to the counter.

"I need to get on this plane," I told the flight attendant.

"The plane has already left, sir," she told me in a thick British accent. "We have another flight leaving for Los Angeles in an hour."

"I'll take it," I said quickly, pulling out my wallet and handing her my credit card.


	11. Chapter 11

I raced through the doors of the Los Angeles Children's Hospital. After a call to Rick, who made a call to Mitchie's manager, I got Caitlyn's cell phone number and called her to ask which hospital Brandon was at. I fricken loved that girl right about now.

"Hi, which room is Brandon Torres in?" I asked the nurse at the desk.

"Are you a family member?"

"Well, no…but…I really need to talk to his sister…" I started. I knew one thing that could probably get me in. "Look, do you know who I am?"

"Yes," she told me.

"Will you tell me what room he's in if I visit all the kids afterwards?" I asked.

She seemed to consider it for a moment before typing something into the computer. "Room 185. But you didn't get that from me."

"Thank you _so much_."

I hurried down the hall towards Brandon's room. What the hell was I going to say to her? Maybe it was a bad idea just to show up like this. Especially given the circumstances. But maybe she needed someone to be there for her. What if she wasn't even there?

She was. As I got a little closer, Mitchie came out of one of the rooms and leaned against the wall. She looked exhausted.

"Mitchie," I called to her.

She looked towards me, a very surprised look on her face. "_Nate?_ What…"

"She could be you."

Did I really just say that? She probably didn't even know what that even meant. Why would she remember what she had said at the airport, about how lucky my future girlfriend would be? She was probably too worried about her brother to remember even seeing me there. Where the hell did that even come from? I felt like I was having an out-of body experience or something. That was something I would only ever say in my head. Maybe I had. Maybe that was just a hallucination.

"What did you just say?" she asked, but by her tone I could tell she'd heard me perfectly.

Shit. I really did say it. I shoved my hands into my pockets nervously and looked down at the floor. "I mean…if you, you know…nothing. Nevermind. I shouldn't have come here. Sorry."

Mitchie just kind of stared at me for a minute and then smirked a little. "You're cute when you're nervous."

Cute. Great. That was one of those things a girl called you before she said, "but I just don't look at you in that way…" I didn't say anything. I guess there wasn't really anything I could say. It's not like I could just tell her that I wanted…

"You want me to be your _real_ girlfriend?"

I laughed uncomfortably at the way she read my mind. I guess she did remember. "Don't sound so surprised. You've been stringing me along since we met and you know it."

She giggled, which made me feel a little better. At least she wasn't running in the other direction. "Is it because I'm such a babe? I mean, you _did _say I was a ten…"

She picked the worst times to mess with me. "Mitchie, stop screwing with me, please. I'm not good at this shit, okay? Don't make it harder than it is."

Wow, who was this person? These are things I would never say, but here they were, coming out of my mouth. Maybe some of her forwardness had worn off on me.

"Well, I had to make sure that you were for real. I'm too much for some people to handle, sometimes."

"What the hell else do I have to say to prove myself to you?" I asked, my frustration evident.

Mitchie laughed. "Well, first, you should probably kiss me."

The stupidest grin broke out across my face. I cupped her face in my hands and kissed her passionately. I knew I could make her see that we should be together. But she said 'first'…was she messing with me again?

"What's second?" I asked suspiciously.

She giggled at my caution and kissed me again. "Take me out tonight? I need to forget about this."

She made an absentminded hand motion to indicate she was talking about the hospital. The stress of even being here again was painted on her face. I didn't know how she was even managing to keep it together so well.

"Absolutely," I said immediately.

All of the sudden, everything seemed perfect. I wrapped my arms around her waist, crashed my lips into hers, picked her up and spun her around.

"You really thought I didn't like you?" she smirked when I finally set her down.

"Well…I don't know…you were kind of sending me a lot of mixed signals…why didn't you say anything?"

"Why didn't _you _say anything?" she answered my question with a question. "Why do you think I came up and talked to you at the MTV Awards in the first place? Why do you think I slept with you?!"

"Because you were drunk out of your mind?" I smirked.

"I was n…" she started defensively, but she couldn't keep a straight face. "Well, yeah, okay, I was, but I still liked you…"

"Hey, I'm not complaining," I replied. I pulled her close to me again. "I mean, if you wanted to do that _again _sometime…"

Mitchie giggled and kissed me quickly. "There'll be time enough for that later, after I know Brandon's going to be okay…I should probably get back in there, anyways."

"Okay," I said.

"I, um…" she started, looking up at me uncomfortably. "I don't want you to take this the wrong way, okay? But, I don't know if…I mean, Brandon gets attached to people really quickly, and…well, we've only been dating for like fifteen seconds, so I don't know if you should…in case it doesn't work out or whatever…"

"Hey, I completely understand. Don't worry about it," I smiled at her. "I have another visit to make, anyways. Call me when you're ready to go?"

"Yeah," Mitchie nodded and kissed me again. "Thanks."

She disappeared into the room and closed the door behind her. I really did understand why she was uncomfortable with me going in with her, but it bothered me a little that she was already questioning whether or not we were going to work out. I know she didn't mean anything by it, though.

I headed back down the hall to the nurses' station. The nurse I had spoken to before noticed me and smiled. "Ready?"

I nodded as she stood up and led me down a different hallway to a big room. I looked through the windows at the rows of beds and the kids. It kind of scared me – they were all so pale and sick-looking. I mean, they were in the cancer ward, so obviously they were sick, but I didn't expect them to be so small. Most of them didn't have hair. I guess I'd never seen a kid with cancer in real life. It was way sadder than on TV. It must be so hard for Mitchie to have to see her little brother like that every single day. I would want to protect him from the press if I were her, too.

"Mr. Black?" the nurse said. By her tone I could tell that she had said my name more than once, but I'd been too shocked to notice.

"Yeah, sorry, I'm ready."

"This is really special for them," she told me. "It's great that you're doing this."

"Anytime," I replied distractedly.

She pushed open the door and walked into the room in front of me.

"Hi, nurse Stacy!" some of the kids said.

She smiled at all of them. "Hey, guys! Someone special has come to hang out with you today! It's Nate from Connect 3!"

I guess they knew who I was, because a lot of them clapped and shouted. I waved at them and tried to hide how nervous I was. "What's up?"

I spent about half an hour taking pictures and talking to the kids before I noticed Mitchie standing on the other side of the windows. I excused myself and slipped into the hallway to see her.

"Hey, Mitch…what's wrong? Is Brandon okay?"

She was crying, but she smiled when she heard the worry in my voice. "He's fine. It's just…you don't know how much it means to them that you're spending time with them. It means a lot to me, too. You're so sweet, Nate."

I wrapped my arms around her shoulders, pulling her close to me and kissing her forehead. I guess so far I was doing pretty well as her real boyfriend. She took my hand and started to lead me down the hallway.

"Come on," she said. "I want you to meet Brandon."

"But I thought…"

She looked over her shoulder at me and smiled. "I changed my mind."

This was a big deal. I was a little nervous.

"My dad's here, too."

Great. Now I was really nervous.

"Brandon? There's someone I want you to meet," Mitchie said as we walked into the room.

He was even sicker looking than the other kids, but he had the biggest grin on his face I'd ever seen. I didn't understand how someone could be so happy even when they might be dying.

"Dad, Brandon, this is Nate…Nate, this is…"

"Hi, Nate! I'm Brandon! I'm six years old and I like baseball!" the little boy said happily. "Are you guys boyfriend and girlfriend? That's what the lady on the TV said."

Mitchie looked at me and laughed, amused by her brother's question. She laced her fingers through mine. "Yeah, Brand, we're boyfriend and girlfriend."

"Are you gonna get married? I always wanted a brother!"

"Hey, what's wrong with sisters?" Mitchie asked, pretending to be hurt by his comment.

Brandon threw his arms around her. "You're the best, Mitchie! But I want a big brother to play baseball with me! And basketball and video games too! Are you gonna be my brother, Nate?"

I smirked. _I_ didn't even have as much energy as this kid, and I was totally healthy. "How about I just be your friend for now? Is that okay?"

"Yeah great! Do you like to play Mario Kart? That's my favorite game in the whole wide world! Wanna play it with me sometime?"

"Yeah, definitely," I agreed.

"Just make sure you clear your whole day, first. Once you start playing, he might not let you stop," Mitchie's dad joked. He held his hand out to me and I shook it. "Call me Steve. It's good to meet you, Nate."

"Nice to meet you, too," I replied.

"Promise you'll come over soon to play Wii, Nate?" Brandon asked.

"You better make it really soon," Mitchie told him. "Nate's going on tour soon, all over the world."

"Wow! Even to Canada?!"

"Actually," I started to correct her. "I think _w__e're_ going on tour soon."

"What?" she asked. She looked at me like I had lost my mind.

"Well, it's not official yet, but our managers are meeting to discuss co-headlining the world tour," I explained.

Her eyes widened and she grinned excitedly. "Are you serious? That would be incredible!"

"I know," I agreed. I'm glad she thought so, too. If she wasn't going on tour with me, I didn't even want to go. "Rick wanted me to convince you to tell your manager that you thought it was a good idea."

"I'm convinced!" she squealed. "I'm going to go call him right now!"

She pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and pressed a speed dial button eagerly. As soon as she had, my phone started ringing. I pulled it out of my pocket and checked the caller ID – I didn't know who's number it was, but it looked familiar.

"Excuse me," I said before I stepped out into the hallway. "Hello?"

"Nate? It's Caitlyn."

"Oh, hey. What's up?"

"I just wanted to see how everything went," she told me. "Did you find her? Did you tell her how you felt?"

I could already tell that Caitlyn and I were going to be good friends. She was like my friends, but better because she didn't make fun of me.

"Yeah, we were just hanging out with Brandon. She feels the same way I do, so…we're not pretending anymore, we're for real," I said.

"That's great! And I just heard about the tour idea! Our manager said nothing was finalized or anything, but our label is really interested, too, so it looks good! Wouldn't that be so much fun?"

"Yeah, it would," I agreed. "Listen, I've gotta go, but thanks for calling. It means a lot."

"Hey, just make my best friend happy, okay?" she replied.

"I'll try my best," I promised. "I'll see you later, Caitlyn."

"See ya, Nate. Say 'hi' to our girl for me!"

"I will. Bye," I said, pressing the 'disconnect' button on my phone. I liked the sound of that -- our girl. _My _girl. This day just kept getting better and better.

**A/N: What do you want to see happen next? PM OR REVIEW WITH IDEAS! I'm totally stuck. I hope you enjoyed the chapter!**


	12. Chapter 12

"Do you guys want to run it one more time?" Rick asked us, trying to keep a serious look on his face.

"Dude, I swear to God…" Shane started.

Rick held up his hands in surrender. "Okay, okay, you're free. Have amazing breaks, because you're not going to have another one for a _long_ time."

We packed up our guitars in record time and practically bolted out of the rehearsal space. After three months of planning, promoting, staging, and rehearsing the tour, we were finally about to do it. We got two weeks off for Christmas, and then after that we would run the entire show for a week, with Mitchie's band and everything like it was a real show, and then we would _finally _get to actually go on tour. We'd been complaining constantly that it wasn't worth all the trouble, but we always did – once we get up onstage that first night, in front of the crowd, we realize it is. Not to say that we don't love playing our music, but rehearsing the same thing for three months with no crowd…it doesn't really have the same thrill-factor.

I threw my guitar in my backseat and turned keys in the ignition when I got to my car. I promised Mitchie I'd pick her up from her practice when I was done with mine. It wasn't too far away.

Mitchie. She was incredible. We were great, Brandon was out of the hospital, the tour was going to be awesome…everything was good. It was Saturday night, which we had a sort-of ritual for now. I'd go over to her place, make her dinner – spaghetti, the only thing I actually knew how to make – then we'd just curl up on the couch and watch a movie, and I usually ended up spending the night. It was my favorite night of the week.

When we got to her house, she went upstairs to take a shower and I got to work in the kitchen. I wasn't making spaghetti, though. I got Jason to teach me how to make quesadillas, so I could surprise her. Lame surprise, I know, but the fact that I learned a new recipe for her should count for something, right?

"You're not making spaghetti?" Mitchie asked, very surprised as she walked into the kitchen. "You know more than one recipe and you never told me?"

I laughed. I knew she would say that. "I got Jason to teach me a new one."

"I'm impressed," she smirked as I handed her a plate. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

I followed her into the living room. Her hair was still wet, and she was wearing a pair of pink shorts and a black hoodie – _my _black hoodie. She had "borrowed" it once when she spent the night a couple months ago. She wasn't very clever when it came to stealing things, because it had my name on the back, but I liked that she wanted to have something of mine.

"I love it when you wear that," I told her and wrapped my arms around her shoulders. "Then everybody knows you're mine."

Mitchie kissed me on the cheek and sat down on her beige, leather couch. She took a bite of her quesadilla and looked at me, pleasantly surprised. "This is really good!"

"Maybe Mexican food is my calling," I joked. "But I think I'll stick to music for awhile. Hey, Mitchie?"

"Yeah?" she asked.

"I want you to come home with me for Christmas."

Mitchie smiled at me in that way that meant she was about to say no. "I'd love to, Nate, but I want to spend it with Brandon…in case…"

"I meant," I interrupted her before she upset herself. She was always planning for the worst. "All of you."

She looked surprised, but a grin spread across her face. "I'd like that. And I'm sure Brandon would warm up to the idea…"

Since the second her little brother found out that I was from Wisconsin, he had been begging for us to take him there. He was probably the first person in history to actually dream of going to Wisconsin. I think it was more the fact that he'd never been so far away that amazed him about it. He'd never been anywhere, really, since he was always too sick. I guess Wisconsin would sound pretty good to me if I were him, too. I can't imagine what in Wisconsin he would be dying to see. But, who knows? He seemed to find the best in everything – I wouldn't be surprised if he found something great about Wisconsin that nobody else ever even noticed.

Mitchie set her empty plate on the coffee table. She curled up under my arm and yawned. We'd both had to be at our rehearsals at 7am – I was fricken tired, too.

"I love you, Nate," she said sleepily.

_That_ woke me up. She had never said that to me before. I'd never said it to her, either, but I'd thought about it. Hell, it was pretty much all I'd been thinking about recently. It meant so much that she said it before I did – I'd been really convinced that I felt a lot more strongly about her than she did about me. You would have thought I learned my lesson about assuming how she felt three months ago, right? Nope.

"I love you too, baby."

She rested her head on my lap and smiled up at me. It was that mischievous smile I'd fallen in love with. "How much?"

At least she didn't ask me if I was in love with her because she was a babe. "A lot."

"More than you ever loved any other girl?" she asked.

"Yep."

"More than your guitar?" she asked.

"Well…which one are we talking about?" I pretended to think about it. "Even more than my '59 Les Paul."

"Wow, that's a whole lot of love," Mitchie smirked, lacing her fingers through mine contently. "Do you think your parents will like me?"

Was she actually nervous about meeting my parents? That was adorable.

"Yes, they'll love you," I promised her. "Taylor already loves you. My mom said she's been singing all your songs 24/7 around the house."

"I hope you're right."

I smiled and kissed her. "I know I'm right."


	13. Chapter 13

"Are we in Wisconsin?!" Brandon asked excitedly as we waited for our luggage, holding onto my hand tightly.

"Yep."

"Wow!" he beamed. "I've never been to Wisconsin before! Do you speak a different language here?"

"No," I told him. He looked disappointed. "But sometimes people wear cheese on their heads."

"Wow! Really?! Wisconsin is so weird!" he laughed.

"You're great with Brandon," Steve smiled at me. He turned to Mitchie. "I like him."

"Yeah, I kinda like him, too," she smirked.

I let go of Brandon's hand to grab my suitcase from the conveyer belt. Our flight had been way more peaceful than we expected. We took the back entrance into the airport in LA to avoid the paparazzi, and only a couple people approached us on the plane. There have never been any paparazzi in Wisconsin, thankfully, so we could relax a little.

"Nate...where's Brandon?" Mitchie asked.

"He's right…" I turned to where he had just been standing, but he was gone. "He was just here…"

I heard his voice and followed the sound. "Hi! I'm Brandon!"

"Oh, shit," I cursed.

He was near the door, surrounded by cameras and reporters. How did they even know we were here?

I bolted towards him, leaving my bags on the floor.

"Where did your hair go?" one of the reporters asked.

"Brandon!" I shouted, trying to get his attention so he wouldn't talk to them. He didn't hear me.

"I was sick, but I'm okay right now!" Brandon explained happily. "Sometimes I get sick again, but not in Wisconsin! Have you seen anybody with cheese on their heads? I want to meet one!"

"You'll have to go to a football game," one of them told him.

"Leave him alone!" Mitchie screamed.

She ran passed me – I didn't know she could run that fast. She scooped her brother up and set him on her hip, trying to hurry him back to get their bags. A photographer jumped in front of them and snapped a picture. She grabbed his camera and threw it to the ground. The lens smashed into a million pieces.

"Do NOT mess with my family," she said angrily.

"This is my sister! She's the best sister in the whole UNIVERSE!" Brandon shouted to the reporters while they were still in earshot.

"Mitchie…" I started, trying to make eye contact with her. She looked like she was going to cry.

She shook her head, silencing me. "Not right now." She set her brother down next to her father. "Stay with dad, okay? And don't talk to anyone else. Don't let go of his hand. Promise?"

"I promise," the little boy replied, the smile gone from his face. "Mitchie, are you mad at me?"

"No, I'm not mad at you. I just don't want you to get hurt, okay? You know you're not supposed to talk to strangers."

"I'm sorry…" he told her.

Mitchie grabbed her bags and walked past the reporters silently. The rest of us just followed her lead. Luckily, I'd arranged a car to meet us at the airport so we didn't have to wait, and we piled inside quickly. Mitchie was silent the entire right. Brandon was staring out the window, asking me about every building we passed. After about twenty minutes, we pulled up to my parent's house.

"Wow! A horse!" Brandon shouted ecstatically as soon as he was out of the car, running towards it. His father followed him, amused by his son's amazement.

"Baby, I'm so sorry," I sighed, taking advantage of my first moment alone with Mitchie.

"For what?" she asked.

"I should have been watching him…"

"Nate, no," she stopped me. "This isn't your fault at all. Even if he'd been handcuffed to you, they still would have seen him when we came out, and he still would have talked his head off. _I_ didn't think there would be any paparazzi here. I don't know why I thought that, but…"

"There's never been any before," I told her. I was just as surprised to see them as she was. "But I guess bringing you home with me is more interesting than when I come by myself."

"Please don't blame yourself. Let's just forget about it for the weekend."

"Okay," I agreed, kissing her softly. "How many cameras have you broken now?"

She laughed. "A few…"

Steve pulled Brandon away from the horses and rejoined us.

"I never would have guessed you were from the country," Steve told me.

I smirked. "I'm a closet farm boy, I guess."

I laced my fingers through Mitchie's and led all of them up the walkway towards the house, but before we even got to the porch, my mother threw open the door happily.

"My baby!" she grinned.

"Hey, mom," I replied as I hugged her.

My dad jogged down the porch steps to meet us and hugged me, too. "Good to have you back, son. I was beginning to think you forgot the address."

I hadn't been home in awhile. Not that I didn't want to, but I was always so busy. Taylor had flown out to visit me a couple of times in LA, though.

"And you must be Mitchie," my mother said. "I'm Debra. Aren't you just the prettiest little thing? Jack, isn't she prettier in real life?"

"She certainly is," he grinned, shaking her hand. "But the way Nate talks about her, I knew she would be."

My parents introduced themselves to Steve and Brandon while Mitchie and I went inside – I don't know why the hell they had to do introductions outside, it was like ten degrees and snowing. Gotta love a Midwest winter…

"Where's Taylor?" I asked as they all finally filed into the house.

"Jill took her to the store with her," my mom told me. "I forgot to get potatoes when I went this morning."

"Jill's here?" I asked with as much fake enthusiasm as I could manage.

Jill was my cousin. She was a couple years older than me, and I know this is mean, but she was a huge bitch. For as long as I could remember, she would do whatever she could to get me in trouble and then she'd pull the protective older cousin card on me. Like once, when I was fifteen, she badgered me into admitting that I took a puff of a cigarette with my friend Mark once and then I started coughing and never did it again. Then she told my mom and when I got mad she said she was worried that I was 'falling in with the wrong crowd' and she just loved me so damn much she felt that she _had _to tell so I could 'get help'.

"Nateeeeeey!" Taylor screamed, throwing her arms around my waist. "I missed you so much!"

"I missed you too, Tay. Hey, I want you to meet someone…" I started.

"Mitchie Torres! I have your CD! You're awesome!"

"Thanks," Mitchie laughed. "I bet you're pretty awesome, too."

"Nathan," I cringed as I heard Jill's voice. She was the only person who called me Nathan, ever. "I haven't seen you're ugly face in awhile."

"Nice to see you too, Jill…" I said through a fake smile.

She turned to Mitchie and looked her up and down. "And this must be the girl who's turned your world upside-down."

I smirked. "Something like that."

"Well, this will be fun," Jill said, almost mischievously.

I was afraid to know what she meant by that, but I was sure I'd find out soon enough.


	14. Chapter 14

"I'll meet you guys down there in a minute," I told my dad when we finally walked through the door.

I hadn't seen Mitchie all day, other than for a few minutes that morning. I'd come downstairs and saw my mom and Jill talking at the kitchen table, but they stopped as soon as they saw me come in. I asked what they were talking about, and they said nothing, but they looked like they were up to something. God knows what.

"I hope you don't mind but we're stealing Mitchie for the day," my mom had said.

"Why?"

"Oh, you know, just some girl time. Lunch, pedicures, shopping…"

Shit. Shopping. It was December 24, which in guy time means time to get your ass to the mall and buy Christmas presents. My dad and Steve had walked in, already dressed.

"Well, ladies, I hope you don't mind, but we've decided we need to do some male bonding," my dad had told them, waving me over. When I was close enough that they couldn't hear, he whispered, "Go get ready…we're going to be in big trouble tomorrow if we don't get to the mall soon."

"You read my mind," I laughed. "Give me ten minutes."

Now my dad, Steve, and Brandon were going to the basement to wrap the presents, but I wanted to say 'hi' to Mitchie first. I bought her this really cool necklace for Christmas – a silver chain with a diamond guitar pendent.

"Hey, Mitch…what's wrong?"

She wiped a few tears away quickly when I opened the door and threw on a fake smile. "What? Nothing! I missed you!"

"I missed you, too…Mitchie, why are you crying?" I asked. I sat down on the bed next to her and put my arm around her.

"I'm not, Nate, everything's fine," she insisted. "Did you have fun today?"

Jill. I don't know what the fuck that dumb bitch did, but whatever Mitchie was upset about, Jill had to be behind it. That's the only reason Mitchie wouldn't want to tell me what's wrong – she wouldn't want to cause a problem between me and my family. I wish Jill wasn't a part of my family, and she sure wasn't going to be after I killed her for whatever she did to make my girlfriend cry.

"What did Jill say to you?" I replied, ignoring her question.

She looked a little startled. "What? Jill's cool."

"Jill's not cool. Mitch, I know she's a bitch, you don't have to act like you like her."

"I do like her, Nate…" Mitchie said slowly.

"Then why are you upset?" I asked again.

"I'm not, Nate, I'm fine."

"Obviously you're not fine, Mitchie. I'm not an idiot, I can see you've been crying. Tell me what's wrong," I told her.

"_Nothing_," she repeated.

I sighed and kissed her softly. "I'm going to find out, whether you tell me or not. I have an insider."

"What?"

"Nothing," I shrugged. "I have to go…help my dad with something. I'll see you in a few minutes."

"Okay," she smiled.

I walked out of the room and straight for Taylor's. Bless her heart, my little sister could not keep a secret to save her life, and that's exactly what I needed right now.

"Tay?"

She looked up from the magazine she was reading and smiled at me. "Hi!"

"Hey, can I talk to you for a sec?" I asked.

"Yes…" she said slowly. She could tell something was wrong. She always could. "Did I do something wrong?"

"No, not at all," I replied. I sat down at the end of her bed. "Did you hear Jill say anything to Mitchie today that might have upset her?"

"Like what?"

"I don't know…like, maybe she told her something about me that wasn't true? Or…said something mean to Mitchie? Anything like that?" I suggested.

Taylor shook her head. "No, they were getting along and laughing all day."

I sighed. What else could it be? And Jill and Mitchie…getting along? That's something I never expected.

"Okay. Thanks, Tay," I said as I stood up and started to leave.

"But mom…"

I stopped dead in my tracks. My mind flashed back to that morning, when my mom and Jill had stopped talking as soon as I walked in the room. I closed the door and sat back down.

"What about mom?"

"Well, we went to the grocery store to get some stuff to make pie for tomorrow, and when we were waiting in line, mom was looking at the tabloids and said to Mitchie that they wrote a lot of bad stuff about her. And Mitchie said that they were all lies, but mom was like, every lie is based on a kernel of truth, and then Mitchie said well they write bad stuff about everyone, but mom was all like well they never wrote anything bad about Nate until he started being seen with you," Taylor explained, in that freakishly fast way that 12-year old girls talk. When did she find time to breathe?

"_Mom_ said that?" I asked, a little shocked.

My mom had always been a little overprotective, but I never thought she would ever involve herself in my business like that…unless she had a little encouragement from a certain bitchy cousin of mine. That's probably what was going on at breakfast this morning – Jill was telling my mom that Mitchie was a slut or something and she was "worried" about me. She should be worrying about herself right about now, I swear to God…

"Yeah and then she was all like Mitchie hanging around you hasn't been doing much good for Nate's reputation and everyone used to think he was such a nice guy and now they probably think different and then she told her that if she really cared about you maybe she should think about what's best for you."

"Thanks, Tay," I said quietly. I got up and walked out of the room, towards the kitchen where I knew my mom was before I even had time to think. I glared at her as soon as I entered the kitchen – she was cutting potatoes for dinner. "How could you, mom?"

"How could I what, sweetie?" she asked innocently.

"You know what," I replied bitterly. "You practically told Mitchie that she wasn't good enough for me. You didn't think I would find out?"

My mom pursed her lips like she always did when she was trying to stay calm. "I think she must have exaggerated because…"

"Mitchie didn't tell me, mom. She didn't tell me anything," I raised my voice. "You basically said that she wasn't welcome in your house and she _protected_ you! Maybe _that_ should tell you a little something about the kind of person Mitchie is."

"Nate, don't raise your voice to me…" she started.

"I love her, mom," I shouted, ignoring her. "**I love her.** You don't know her. Maybe if you'd taken the time to even talk to her you'd realize what an amazing girl she is, _no matter what Jill says_. I can't believe you would let her convince you that all that shit in the tabloids is true. It's not, mom, none of it. And even if it was, it's not up to you to decide who I'm going to date and who I'm not!"

I stormed out of the kitchen and back upstairs before she could say anything else. I didn't want to hear it.

"Mitchie, I'm so sorry," I said as soon as I walked into the room. "My mom had no right to…"

"No," she interrupted me. "Maybe she's right. People _have _started writing a lot of shit about you since we started dating, and…you're such a good guy, Nate. I'm not good enough for you."

I wrapped my arms around her. She pretended to be tough, but sometimes she let what people say really get to her. I just wish it hadn't been this. "Stop, babe. I don't deserve _you_. You're the best thing that ever happened to me. I don't care what my mom said. I know she only said it because of Jill anyways. Jill tries to ruin my life any chance she gets. I'm sorry she dragged you into it."

Mitchie buried her head in my chest. "I love you, Nate."

"I love you too, baby."

"Mitchie?"

We both looked up – my mom was standing at the door. She took a few steps into the room uncomfortably.

"Mitchie, I want to apologize for what I said. I was wrong. I just want what's best for my son…and, he say that you're what's best for him. So…I believe him. I'm sorry. I hope you'll give me another chance. I'd really like to get to know the girl my son fell so in love with," she explained.

Mitchie smiled weakly and nodded. "I'd like that."


End file.
